


Under the Same Sky

by Azzandra



Category: Dragon Age - All Media Types, Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: Drabble Collection, F/F, Pre-Canon
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-03-03
Updated: 2015-03-03
Packaged: 2018-03-16 04:38:16
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 853
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3474719
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Azzandra/pseuds/Azzandra
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <i>Tell the tale of Tyrdda Bright-Axe, mountain maker,</i>
  <br/>
  <i>spirit's bride</i>
</p>
            </blockquote>





	Under the Same Sky

All followers of Dirthamen had their masks. Their secrets were hard-earned and jealously kept, and their faces grew stony and blank over time, revealing nothing. But not strange, flighty Aval'var, who hid all her secrets behind smiles and easy laughter.   
  
Aval'var dreamed.  
  
She knew the rewards which could come from walking the paths of the Fade.   
  
It was not mere luck that she was a favored of Dirthamen, exalted as first among his followers and honored with more titles beyond count. She always returned from her journeys with secrets to whisper in her prayers, hidden knowledge falling from her tongue for no one but her Lord Dirthamen.  
  
So Aval'var dreamed. She traveled to new places where she might lay her head, casting her mind far from the shining spires of Arlathan, outside the boundaries of vibrant Elvhenan.  
  
From mountains to plains she dreamed, searching for hidden things.  
  


* * *

  
  
Tyrdda listened.  
  
The spirits spoke for who cared to hear, and the skies still brimmed with more spirits than blades of grass. Away from her tribe and alone in the woods, there was no one to distract Tyrdda from her task.  
  
She knelt before a gnarled and blackened tree, its spindly branches nearly bare of leaves. She listened. And when she knew what to do, she slipped the dagger out of her boot and dug up the earth around the tree's roots.  
  
She found the source of corruption, the ugly black fang dripping ichor and poisoning the tree. She removed it and with a flick of her fingers burned the dead diseased wood, and when she was done she filled the hole with earth again.  
  
 _Thank you,_  the spirit in the tree whispered, weakened but no longer screaming in pain.  _How shall I reward you?_  
  
“By growing strong,” Tyrdda replied.  
  
She took only the fang for herself, and continued on.  
  


* * *

  
  
Was it whim, or curiosity? Why had Aval'var's attention been drawn to the quickling? Humans were rough creatures, bound tightly to the waking world, passing too briefly through it to warrant notice.  
  
But this one walked the Fade. She spoke to spirits even when she was awake and they spoke back. They clamored around her like old friends— _Tyrdda, Tyrdda,_  they called—and for everything Tyrdda accepted from them, she gave something in return.  
  
It was not something that would have ever occurred to an Elvhen Dreamer, who felt themselves entitled to whatever spirits could give them. It filled Aval'var with a strange unease she could not name, and it stoked her curiosity at the same time.  
  
So when Tyrdda dreamed, Aval'var watched. If there was something to hold her attention about the creature, doubtless there was also something to learn. There was no harm in it, when Aval'var could easily conceal herself from her notice.  
  


* * *

  
  
“Dreamer's Eyes,” the tribe called Tyrdda. “Dreamer's Eyes, what do you see? Dreamer's Eyes, what do the spirits whisper to you?”  
  
She would tell them: the spirits whispered wisdom.   
  
“Does it make you strong?” they asked.  
  
“Better a warrior be wise than strong,” the shaman chided, and the tribesmen would avert their eyes in deference to the old woman.  
  
Tyrdda would look away as well, but only to hide a smile. She was still young enough that it pleased her to be called a warrior.  
  


* * *

  
  
Was it a warrior, or a Dreamer that Aval'var watched?   
  
Surely one could not be both, she thought, watching Tyrdda cut down her enemies with fire and ice.

 

* * *

 

 

“Does the leaf-eared woman still bother you, Tyrdda?” the shaman would ask whenever Tyrdda returned from her quests.  
  
Tyrdda unslung the staff from her back as she sat down. She was always careful to keep the blackened fang at its tip aimed well away from any living creature she did not intend to kill, and so she set the weapon on the ground.  
  
“Would that she even spoke to me, Elder,” Tyrdda replied. “But she skulks like a shade at the edges of my dreams, and thinks me too dull to notice.”  
  
“But does she  _bother_  you, I asked,” the shaman repeated, giving a gap-toothed smile.  
  
“I only just finished telling you I wish she  _would_ , Elder,” Tyrdda said, grinning back.  
  


* * *

  
  
In the end, it was not in dreams that they properly met for the first time, but in the rosy light of dawn.  
  
Aval'var could not say what stirred her from her sleep and scattered her dreams. She slept in the open, but had set wards, strong enough to keep her safe from anything wandering the woods, or else subtle enough to wake her if anything more dangerous approached.  
  
She blinked awake, sitting up in her bedroll, and she was startled into full wakefulness by the sight of Tyrdda, just outside the wards.  
  
The human sat in the grass, her legs crossed, her staff flat on the ground next to her. Her elbow was propped on her knee, and her chin set in her hand.  
  
She had eyes gleaming amber, like a great hunting cat.  
  
They watched each other, fascinated and fascinating. For the moment, it was all they dared. But the wards came down, eventually.


End file.
